


The Bear that Dug and The Fish that Cried

by Maybethings



Category: Dangan Ronpa
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fairy Tale, And so the bear lay down with the fish, Dark, F/F, Fractured Fairy Tale, Kipling, Parody
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-08
Updated: 2012-07-08
Packaged: 2017-11-10 23:49:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,205
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/472085
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Maybethings/pseuds/Maybethings
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Once upon a time, a bear and a fish were friends. When they could not share each other’s worlds, the bear struck out to find a solution…at a great price.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Bear that Dug and The Fish that Cried

Gather round, children, and I will tell you a tale. It is not the tale of the Lion’s Garden, or the Flower and the Diamond. It is not the tale of the Butterfly that Played. This is the tale of the Bear that Dug and the Fish that Cried.

Now attend all over again and listen!

Once in the long ago, a white bear lived in a forest. She was the strongest animal in all the land. She fought in the hills, and she fought in the valleys; she stripped the trees of their bark and cracked stones with her strength. The other forest creatures feared her, and called her all sorts of rude names like monster and ogre. They did it so often, everyone forgot the name she had before—even the bear herself. But really, Ogre was just a white bear who liked berries and fighting and testing her strength just a little more than other animals.

Ogre wasn’t a pretty bear, even by bear standards. Terrible scars criss-crossed her fierce bear paws. Another large one went all the way across her fierce bear snout. She had a fierce bear face, and fierce bear eyes that looked like she would eat you up at any moment. Ogre preferred berries and fish and other things like that, but it was hard to explain this to any beast when they all ran in terror at the sight of her. So she wandered through the forest on her own, fighting all who would challenge her and minding her business otherwise.

She was very lonely.

One day, Ogre wandered down to the river for a drink. In the water she saw a strange fish. It was blue from head to tail, with a splash of brown over its back. The fish had the most merry eyes, and a brilliant smile—at least it would, if a fish could smile. It swam right up to the bear and waved a fin.

“Hello!” said the fish.

“Greetings,” said the bear.

“My name is Blue. What’s yours?”

Ogre stared at Blue. The fish was clearly new to the forest. Most others were scared of her (for good reason, because she liked eating them). “They call me Ogre,” she replied, sitting down on her bear bottom. “Perhaps because I am so large and frightening.”

“That’s silly, and they’re silly,” Blue exclaimed, blowing bubbles derisively. “You’re not a monster. You’re a bear! What did they call you when you were born?”

“I cannot remember,” Ogre replied. “It has been a long, long time since anyone hailed me by such a name.”

“I’m sorry, Ogre,” said Blue. “But I’d still like to be your friend.”

“Fish do not befriend bears. How do you know I will not catch you and eat you all up?” she growled, showing her fierce bear teeth and her fierce bear claws. Blue just laughed, swimming in circles round Ogre’s large front paws.

“Because you’d have to catch me, and nobody’s ever managed to catch me—and because I know that’s berry juice on your teeth, not blood.”

From that day on, Ogre and Blue became fast friends. Both would meet by the riverbank to talk and share stories. Ogre spoke of the forest: of the silent, noble trees that whispered in the wind, of the leaping hare and the creeping fox, of the taste of ripe berries and what bark felt like underneath your claws. Blue spun tales of the water: of the blessed hush of the world below, of the stout crayfish and the shy elver, of speeding against the current, feeling it rush through your gills and over your fins. But all the two had were stories, never shared experiences. Bears have no fins, and fish have no claws. Some things, the world will not permit.

Despite knowing this, Ogre was troubled. She dearly wanted to enter Blue’s world, or at least share hers with the kind little fish. Blue was one of the only friends she had, and the bear had grown to care for her deeply over the months.

So she asked her other friend, Sapling, for help.

You might think Sapling was another bear, or a bird, or a bug. No, Sapling was just that: a sapling, no good for sharpening claws or practising tackles on. He had sprouted in the forest only a few years back, and for whatever reason, was one of the only forest trees who would talk to other animals. Not being otherwise old or venerable, most of the forest took little notice of him. But Sapling’s roots ran deep into the earth, and he knew many secrets that others did not.

“I know many secrets others don’t, Ogre-bear,” he said when questioned, waving his long branches. “I know why the flowers dance. I know what lives on the island in the river. I know the names of ten gods and a thousand games. But I do not know how a bear and a fish can share worlds.”

“Then I am at a loss,” sighed Ogre.

“You know I always tell you the truth, because that is how I was grown,” the tree said at last. “There is one who might be able to help you. One of your kind.”

“Another bear?”

“One who knows magic,” Sapling said, and he quaked like an aspen. “Monobear, they call him. He lives on the highest hill in this forest, and if you see him, you will know him by his half-white fur. But Ogre-bear, be careful of him. He says his words are true, but he twists them like reeds. Take care that he does not harm you—or Blue.”

Even then, Ogre would not be discouraged. She crossed field and mountain, and climbed the high hills, surrounded by clouds and mist. At last, the fog around her broke, and before her eyes stood a handsome bear. He was indeed half-white as Sapling had told her—but not with age. One side of his body was white as snow, and the other black as night.

“So you are the bear that wants to become a fish,” he said, in a high voice like a cub’s. Ogre was a little bit afraid and she wanted to run away, but she had never run away from anything before.

“I do not wish to change into a fish,” she growled. “I simply want to see my friend’s world as my own.”

“I have such a way,” Monobear said. “But it will cost you much.” And he laughed, upupupupu, the way only a true Monobear laughs.

Ogre had nothing to offer in return. Bears, after all, do not carry purses of gold. Or any sort of purses, for that matter. After some thought, she said: “I put myself in your service. I am strong, and I can fight and catch fish and tell good berries from bad.”

“Monobear needs no such things.” The dark half of his face smirked. “But I am fond of stories. The forest will not tell me theirs, which is such a shame. They are pretty, powerful things. Bring them to me as you hear them.”

“The animals fear me,” she growled. “They will not stand my presence.”

“They will not stand you, yes. But what about a tiny brown mole? Who would even suspect such a small, helpless creature?” And before Ogre could ask what Monobear meant, or what was even going on, she suddenly found herself changed into a mole: a small, weak, half-blind creature with claws to dig through the soft earth, and ears that would catch every word said in its presence. “Serve me for a month, and I will show you how you and your fish friend can be together. But if you tell anyone at all about our little secret, or disobey me, I’ll never change you back, and you can dig in the dark earth for always.”

“If I do this for you, you’ll help me?” she asked him.

“Of course,” said Monobear. “I am a very honest bear.”

So it was that Monobear put Ogre under a spell. By day, she was the white bear the forest knew and feared. By night, she was a little brown mole, digging down, down, down under caves and burrows, listening to the deepest secrets of the forest. She heard where the ants hid in the leaves, and the secrets of the wild mulberry, and the murmurings of the round river stones. Every morning, she would dig up, up, up to tell all these stories to Monobear, and he would change her back into her true form until night came again.

“You’re growing thin, dear Ogre, and your fur is more brown than white,” Blue said to her one day. “Don’t push yourself too hard, whatever you’re doing. It’s not like you.”

“Do not worry, Blue,” she replied. “What I am doing will be worth it in the end.”

But to her friend Sapling, Ogre said in confidence: “Should anything happen to me, please take care of Blue.”

“I can’t do that, Ogre-bear,” Sapling said. “I’m just a tree.”

When the month and her service was ended, Ogre the mole dug her way up, up, up through Monobear’s hill—and popped out before a gathering of the forest animals, staring down at her in horror. And Monobear, too, looked down at her with his strange, crazed half-grin.

“This is my mole, the one you suspected!” he crowed triumphantly. “This one has carried to me all your stories, and made them mine! But look now, and see her true form!” And quick as a wink, Monobear unravelled the spell, leaving a muddy, bewildered Ogre standing before a crowd of furious animals.

“Kill the traitor!” the beasts roared, and the forest took up the call. Ogre ran. Strong as she was, she couldn’t fight them all at once.

The whole forest chased Ogre up and down hill and valley: the ants hiding in their leaves, the ten gods Sapling knew by name, the hawk and the fox, the wolf and the stag and her fellow bear. She ran to shake them off, ignoring pain and fatigue, until she saw the great river running before her, a shimmering line of light under the moon.

Two full feet from the water’s edge lay Blue, twitching weakly under dry air. Ogre saw a flash of white and black flit back into the forest, familiar gurgling laughter fading away with it.

Ogre was not a gentle bear; she had fierce bear claws and fierce bear teeth, and Blue’s tender scales would yield quickly to either of those. But Ogre was strong, the strongest bear in all the land, and her only wish now was to save her friend from death.

So Ogre started to dig.

Her claws ploughed through the earth and stones, dirt flying everywhere as she carved a channel from the water toward the stranded fish. But the stolid earth and the chilly, muddy river both seemed to do their best to thwart her. Cold air and colder water mingled in her lungs, and her claws broke and bled upon the harsh stones. But she did not stop until the ground had yielded to her, and the channel was dug, and the river flowed around Blue’s form again.

“Why didn’t you tell me you were the mole, dear Ogre?” Blue asked.

“I was afraid. You would have scorned me,” Ogre replied, and she hung her great head in shame, feeling very weak and tired as she sank into the water. All her strength was gone.

“I would never have,” the fish cried, and kissed her friend’s scarred snout. “I made a deal with Monobear, too, just this night: I wanted to help you remember your name! But he stranded me here instead.”

“I remember it now, Blue. Cherry was my name. Under such a tree was I born. The river calls to you.” Ogre closed her eyes and nudged the fish gently. “Here I will rest. I will find Monobear again, and make things right. Forget me and go.”

“No,” Blue said, and she wept large tears that plopped into the river water. “You are my friend, dear Cherry, and I will stay with you to the last.”

The morning sun rose, chasing the moon from the sky, as hawk and fox and stag and bear found their quarry at last. But where the bear had fallen, there was no body: only a large and stately cherry tree, raining pink petals down over the bank though spring was far away. And all around it grew hollyhocks, round leaves like fish scales and cheerful pink blossoms waving in the breeze, speckled with shining dew.

“Well, that’s that,” said one of the ten gods rather impatiently. “This was quite pointless. Let’s all go to bed.”

The forest animals all went back to their homes and burrows and nests, and slept deep and dreamless sleeps. Without the mole or the bear or the fish to trouble them, they all lived happily ever after. But wasn’t Monobear wonderfully clever?

Is it true? I hear you ask. Yes, every word.

Because, after all, I have told you this story…and I am a very honest bear.


End file.
